Lore | Hollow Knight Silksong Wiki

The Citadel

 

 

The Kingdom of Pharloom Beyond the Citadel

 

 

Former or Current Tribes And their Areas Around Pharloom

These tribal areas host or used to host the Indigenous bugs of the land that pre-dates the arrival of Grand Mother Silk and the establishment of the Kingdom of Pharloom. Some of the tribes of this area has already been wiped out by Pharloom while some like the Skarr still remain to this day.

 

Verdania

Verdania Tribe

Location: Verdania

 

Sands of Karak

 Coral/Karak Tribe

Location: Sands of Karak, Coral Tower

 

Far Fields

Skarr Ant Tribe

Location: Far Fields, Hunter's March

 The tribe that inhabits this land are known as the Skarr. A highly militaristic tribe led by Skarrsinger Karmelita while Gurr the Outcast is one of their most prominent warriors. One could argue the reason why the Ants of Skarr still exist even with Pharloom's continued desire for domination of all bugs is that they have simply made any attempts by the holy kingdom to subjugate them as painful as possible. Many traps populate their land in the Far Fields. Those not taken by the traps, the Skarr's warriors descend upon. From the looks of it, their efforts seems to work as their tribe still stands, while others has already been swept to history.

Enemies part of the Skarr Tribe: Skarrwing, Skarrlid, Skarr Scout, Skarr Stalker, Spear Skarr, Last Claw, Skarrgard

 

Shellwood

Shellwood Tribe

Location: Shellwood

 

The Kingdom of Hollownest

 

Descriptor 5

Interpretations

 

 

Why the Snared Silk required so many wishes

The Ending in Attaining the  Snared Silk is a long journey for Hornet. As to be able to get the dialogue with the Caretaker and start the quest. A tremendous amount of Wishes are needed to be fulfilled.  This is an important part of Hornet own's personal Character development because the Hornet that simply marched towards the Citadel and Defeated Grand Mother Silk simply replaces her as the Monarch of Pharloom. This is the ending in which Hornet did not go against the nature of Higher Beings to simply dominate all the other bugs. 

 Compare this to the conversation with Hornet and Caretaker if she performs all the wishes. In which Hornet will expound on how though she feels the need to dominate and control. Her time in Pharloom assisting and helping the other bugs with their wishes was an active choice she made to live beyond the nature of Higher Beings to rule. The Hornet who gains the Snared Silk to defeat Grand Mother Silk is the Hornet who developed to care for other bugs and not allow her nature as someone descended from a Higher Being control her. Methaphorically, it also contrasts her against Grand Mother Silk, someone who is fully enslaved by this nature leading to a self-destructive path and the loss of not only her beloved children the weavers but also the eternal hatred of their replacement, Lace.

Silksong Interpretation

by User u-3B512

Hornet is captured into pharloom. Meanwhile the void has destroyed Hallownest and spreads (the Devs said a combo of all endings). Herrah is one of the creatures descended from this kingdom (spider, hence spider kingdom). Pharlooms folly is that it thinks it is not under a sway of a higher being (a higher being must be involved somehow). Lore reveal is that higher beings are those who through some sort of process begin to interweave themselves within aspects of reality, becoming inseparable from them (both the Pale king and the radiance caused ruin to the world, the issue is higher beings, but higher beings are life apparently and also interlinked to concepts, so they must be life which weaved themselves with concepts).

 And the true ruler of Pharloom is a higher being known as the Grand Mother Silk which is weaved into the idea of song and melody. Songs which give a idea of a paradise free from higher beings, when in fact it is one. (True villain must be a higher being, radiance is linked to light concept, likewise it is linked to a concept, that is song). And given the lore reveal, it is that higher beings cannot be truly destroyed, simply subsumed by other higher beings, which take the concepts they are weaved into (Void consumes radiance). There are hints that there is a reason why higher beings can come to be, something linked to the nature of bugs. Why do bugs weave themselves to things? So that they will be eternal. Bugs by nature will perish. Consuming concepts within them, hungry insects will never die. (Hungry knight, why do higher beings exist). A insatiable hunger in insects is what allows life to have higher beings. Either way, silksong is not the final game, and the ruler of Pharloom will simply be consumed by some other Higher being. 

Which could include Hornet herself or the Void.

There may be a way to get higher beings to release what they have consumed and making sure that nothing can consume it again. This could be the plot of a final installment, Hollow Knight III. My bets are that the main Antagonist of HK3 is the void.  And instead of focusing on one kingdom, expect multiple kingdoms with higher beings under threat of the void. It will have multiple endings. But crucial ending is definitely releasing all concepts consumed by the void and the higher beings, and make sure nothing can consume said concepts again.

The Protagonists of HK 3 would be hornet and Lace who would have to find a way to get out of the void somehow. Getting out of the void would be key to releasing anything else the void has consumed.

 

PLOT SUMMARY 

by Bugsby

One of the primordial forces in the world of Hollow Knight is the void. The void is primarily found at the bottom of the world, in a great, hungering pool known as the abyss. None fully understand the nature of the void. It is somehow related to soul, the energy that animates all living things, since the techniques that manipulate soul can also manipulate void. The snail shamans know much of both void and soul, but they do not share their secrets. In ancient times, some long-forgotten civilization figured out how to use void vessels to store soul. This led some to think that void is a kind of emptiness that soul could be filled into. That is a mistake. Void is not emptiness. It is negation. It hungers, devours, and destroys. It can be tamed, but its nature cannot be changed.

Most of the creatures in the world of Hollow Knight are bugs. These are bugs like the bugs we know, mindless insects. But there are also higher beings. Higher beings elevate the consciousness of bugs around them, making them capable of rational thought and enabling bugs to establish societies. The most powerful of these higher beings are the pale beings. They elevate intelligence to great levels, and create vast modern societies that are invariably dedicated to the worship of those pale beings.

The story of Silksong begins in the land of Pharloom. Pharloom was home to a pale being of great power, Grand Mother Silk. Grand Mother Silk had the power to create silk (as some bugs such as spiders and silkworms can) and to manipulate it at will; she is something of a Goddess of Silk. Grand Mother Silk wanted children, but apparently could not have any children in the normal way. So she infused some of the spiders of Pharloom with her silk, elevating their nature and giving them a share of her power. These elevated spiders were the Weavers. Grand Mother Silk told the Weavers that she was their mother, and that they were gods, just like her. That was the first lie.

Society in Pharloom developed the way it always seems to in the presence of a pale being; the bugs of Pharloom worshipped Grand Mother Silk as a god. The Weavers were her instruments and her presence among the people. They were celebrated as protectors, because of their great strength and skill with weapons, and as healers, because of their ability to bind wounds with silk. But silk binding is not mere bandaging. It suffuses the essence of the healed bug with silk, and that silk infestation is hereditary; parents bound with silk have children bound with silk. After some time, all of the bugs of Pharloom had a string of silk wrapped around their hearts.

The peace in Pharloom was shattered when the Weavers discovered that Grand Mother Silk was not their true mother. She had lied. The Weavers responded to the discovery of this insult by turning on Grand Mother Silk. They did not kill her, but used the power of song to lull her into a deep sleep. But what next? How would they govern Pharloom now that their god was removed from the picture? The bugs of Pharloom still worshipped her. And what sleeps might awake; were the Weavers doomed to eternal vigilance, forever singing their god to sleep?

They came up with an elegant solution to these problems by establishing the Citadel of Song. The bugs of Pharloom would continue to be drawn to worship Grand Mother Silk, but Grand Mother Silk would be locked away at the top of this Citadel. Bugs coming to the Citadel would be instructed in the ways of song, and so Grand Mother Silk would sleep forever. The citadel was led by the Keepers (who keep the accumulated knowledge and songs of the Citadel), the Architects (who designed and maintained the mechanical contraptions that run the Citadel), and the Conductors, who would lead the bugs of the citadel in all things, including song. The choristers of the citadel would sing, but many bugs were also worked to the bone (to the shell?) to maintain the Citadel. Their were held in thrall by their faith. That was the second lie.

The Weavers continued their role as protectors and healers. Bugs from around Pharloom made a pilgrimage to the Citadel, and the Weavers kept the roads safe for the pilgrims. Yet Pharloom changed in this time. The great spirits and primitive civilizations that had flourished there during the era of the first lie diminished and died out. Pharloom became a land dedicated to the Citadel, and the poisons of the Citadel’s exhaust ruined many of the regions of Pharloom. Under the rule of the Weavers and the Conductors, Pharloom became a more grim place.

Yet in the world of Hollow Knight, there is great power in dreaming, and while Grand Mother Silk slept, she retained great power. Every bug of Pharloom had a silken thread around its heart, a thread that Grand Mother Silk could pull on, even in sleep. Her influence spread through the land again, as bugs were brought under the command of Grand Mother Silk. This phenomenon came to be known as the Haunting, and none but the Weavers knew its true nature.

The Weavers retreated from the Citadel to their Weavenests far below and on the edges of Pharloom. There they tried to hide from the gaze of Grand Mother Silk and plot how they might end her threat once and for all. Killing her would be suicidal, since the bugs of Pharloom would revert to a savage state without her presence. So they attempted to engineer a pale being of their own in Weavenest Atla, the creature Eva. But Eva was flawed and weak, and eventually the Weavers despaired of overthrowing Grand Mother Silk once and for all. They fled Pharloom for other lands.

One group of Weavers, led by Herrah the Beast, established themselves in Deepnest, an area of spiders and other creepy-crawly bugs and beasts. They were not higher beings who could elevate the consciousness of those spiders, but they were kin to the spiders, and were able to thrive there. Some time after, another pale being, the wyrm known as the Pale King, established the kingdom of Hallownest next to Deepnest. The Weavers did not like the Pale King, doubtless because of their previous experience with Great Mother Silk, and the Weavers and their spider kin fought off the intrusion of the bugs of Hallownest into their territory.

Then one day the Pale King came to Herrah asking a favor. He was having trouble with another higher being, known as the Radiance, which lived in his people’s dreams and corrupted their minds. He had a plan to lock the Radiance away for good. He would first procreate with another local pale being, the White Lady, and throw the resulting eggs down into the abyss. The children that were born would be beings of void, making them perfect empty vessels for soul. He would then take the strongest of them, the Hollow Knight, and use the power of soul to channel the Radiance into the Hollow Knight. The Hollow Knight would then itself be sealed with the power of dreams. The Pale King needed three powerful dreamers to seal the Hollow Knight, and he wanted Herrah to be one of them. Herrah agreed, but only on the condition that the Pale King give her a child of her own. And so Herrah gave birth to Hornet, half Weaver and half wyrm. Hornet was raised by the Weavers and by her mother, until Herrah had to go to her duty and sleep eternally to seal the Hollow Knight and the Radiance. Hornet trained with the bees of Hallownest, becoming deadly with her needle. She then took on the mantle of the protector of Hallownest, defeating any who would disturb her mother’s seal on the Hollow Knight.

Meanwhile, back in Pharloom, conditions were deteriorating. Without the Weavers to watch the roads, the pilgrimage became incredibly dangerous, and the flow of pilgrims to the Citadel slowed to next to nothing. The population of the Citadel began to drop, as accident claimed the lives of many bugs. Desperate to maintain the Citadel, the conductors took to healing the bugs of the citadel by stuffing their injured shells with silk in the whiteward. This reckless experimentation created horrors of silk, and even those bugs who were successfully healed were simply bound ever more tightly with threads of silk around their hearts, in their brains, through their guts. The Haunting intensified, and the Citadel began to fall into ruin.

Grand Mother Silk regained enough power to make some new daughters. Unlike the Weavers, who were elevated bugs, Phantom and Lace were beings made entirely of silk. They were not mere puppets of Grand Mother Silk, but had free will of their own. But they were still flawed and tortured creations. Phantom was made of weak material. Her body frayed and grayed, and she was sent to decay in the exhaust organ. Lace’s body was made of sturdier stuff, but her mind was weak. She succumbed to a nihlistic insanity, cursing her mother for her creation. They were not the protectors that Pharloom needed.

So Grand Mother Silk came to the conclusion that Pharloom needed the Weavers back. Pharloom had flourished most during the era of the first lie when the Weavers were her main servants. The only problem was that they had rebelled, but that was a problem easily fixed. So Grand Mother Silk sent her followers from the Citadel out to find the Weavers and bring them back to Pharloom. Any descendents of the Weavers that they found would be bound with runes to suppress their powers until they could be delivered to the Citadel. There they would be impaled with silken stakes to give Grand Mother Silk direct control over them, making them into puppets like the rest of the bugs of Pharloom.

In Hallownest, things were also going badly. The Pale King’s plan to contain the Radiance had failed, for he did not understand the void. His Hollow Knight was not an empty vessel, it was simply a tamed version of the hungering void. It could be corrupted by the Radiance, and it was. The Radiance’s influence spread once again, and Hallownest descended into madness. The Pale King retreated to his white palace where he died, leaving Hornet as Hallownest’s lone protector.

Eventually, salvation came in the form of another of the Pale King’s children, who journeyed beyond Hallownest into the wilds beyond and returned strengthened from the experience. Hornet tried to kill this “little ghost” at first, as she had others of the Pale King’s void-infused children, but this one was too powerful. Knowing that the plan to contain the Radiance had failed, Hornet aided the little ghost in its quest to break the seal on the Hollow Knight’s prison and become fully attuned with the power of the void inside itself. She even stood aside and let the little ghost kill Herrah, breaking the last seal on the Hollow Knight’s prison. Hornet then attacked the Hollow Knight alongside the little ghost, distracting it long enough for the little ghost to enter its dreams. There, the little ghost confronted the Radiance, and consumed the higher being with the hungering power of the void. Its mission completed, the little ghost, together with the rest of the Pale King’s void children, melted away into the abyss. Hornet was left to watch over the dead kingdom of Hallownest.

But then the choristers from the Citadel found her, bound her, and took her back to Pharloom. Lace saw the convoy coming, and knew that if Hornet was brought to the Citadel, Hornet would be staked and enslaved, giving Grand Mother Silk a powerful servant. So Lace dispelled the runes on Hornet’s cage, and Hornet escaped, miraculously surviving the fall when the cage she had been traveling in plummeted into the depths of Pharloom. When Hornet encountered Lace shortly after, Lace tried to kill her, but Hornet proved too strong, forcing Lace to retreat.

Hornet fought her way through Pharloom to the Citadel, helping the bugs of Pharloom along the way. Inside the Citadel, she found a snail shaman, who noticed her benevolence with a contempt that over time evolved into genuine admiration. What did Hornet want? To take Grand Mother Silk’s place as the tyrant of Pharloom? Or to end the nightmare of the Haunting once and for all? Hornet said that she wanted to make an end of Grand Mother Silk’s rule. And so the snail shaman empowered a trap from Weavenest Atla with soul energy and set it in Grand Mother Silk’s chamber, telling Hornet to activate it when the time was right.

Hornet fought Lace again, the final guardian to Grand Mother Silk’s chamber, and in defeat Lace admitted to her hatred of her mother and her desire to end her own life. Hornet then fought and defeated Grand Mother Silk, and activated the snail shaman’s trap. A portal to the abyss opened, and Grand Mother Silk was sucked in, grabbing onto Hornet in order to take the warrior with her. But then Lace attacked Grand Mother Silk, cutting off her mother’s arm and rescuing Hornet. Mother and daughter were pulled together into the abyss.

Grand Mother Silk would not allow her daughter to be consumed by the abyss. She was in many ways the worst mother ever, but she still loved Lace in her own way, and would do anything to save her. She formed a cocoon of silk around herself and Lace to hold the void at bay, but the void still managed to seep in, corrupting and consuming mother and daughter. And because Grand Mother Silk’s silken threads stretched all throughout Pharloom, the void traveled along those threads, and the land itself was corrupted and consumed.

Hornet met with the snail shamans to see if there was a way to stop the void from destroying Pharloom. After discovering the cause of the threat, the snail shamans came up with a plan to save Pharloom. They taught Hornet a song to allow her to travel into memories of the past, to find the hearts of Pharloom from a time before the Citadel, a time when the land was strong. Hornet found the hearts of Pharloom, and gave them to the snail shamans, who then performed a ritual to send her back through her own memories of Hallownest. There she found the White Lady, who gave her an Everbloom, a delicate flower with the power to resist and negate the void. Everbloom in hand, Hornet descended to the abyss, and jumped in. The void tried to tear her apart, but the Everbloom shielded her.

Deep inside the abyss, she found Grand Mother Silk and Lace inside a great cocoon, with Lace wholly corrupted by the void. Hornet fought Lace one last time, purging her corruption. Then, infused with power from Grand Mother Silk, Hornet leapt from the cocoon, speeding towards the surface. The void attacked again, and this time the Everbloom was destroyed by the assault, leaving Hornet and Lace vulnerable. Yet just as they were about to be torn apart, the little ghost appeared, calming the void and protecting its sister and her misbegotten ward.

The little ghost placed Hornet and Lace gently on the shores of the abyss before melting back into the void. Far below them, Grand Mother Silk succumbed to the void. The void-infused silken chains that had cursed Pharloom melted away, leaving Hornet and Lace to face an uncertain future.